


Harm's Way

by VivWiley



Series: Harm's Way [1]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-19
Updated: 2013-05-19
Packaged: 2017-12-12 06:45:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/808516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VivWiley/pseuds/VivWiley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Skinner reaches a decision about where he stands in relation to the shadow government, and begins to understand its consequences.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Harm's Way

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: The characters of Dana Scully, Fox Mulder, Walter Skinner, and the Cigarette Smoking Man are the property of Chris Carter, Fox Broadcasting and Ten-Thirteen Productions, and have been used without permission. No copyright infringement is intended, nor are the characters being used for commercial purposes.
> 
> This was first published in February 1997.

_Walter Skinner's apartment, Crystal City, VA  
3:30 a.m._

He started awake -- the gun shot still echoing in his ears. The memory of fire and pain in his gut so immediate that he found himself clutching his stomach; his fingers finding only the scar instead of the expected stickiness of blood.

Fully awake now, his rational mind smoothly taking control again, he was only vaguely surprised to realize that in his dream -- reliving the shooting in the cafe -- instead of Cardinale's face, his would-be-assassin had had no face at all.

It was, he supposed, inevitable. It was, he supposed, only the first of many such nightmares.

But there had been no real decision to make. The odd thing, in fact, was that his decision had been made years ago. Had in fact been made at the moment of his greatest triumph against Him. Against that black-lunged son-of-a-bitch. _This is where you pucker up and kiss my ass._

Skinner had known, even then, that there would be a day of reckoning for the DAT and the Navajo code talkers. It was a turning point. He'd openly declared his allegiance in the unspoken cold war that was being waged in and around the Justice Department. Even while savoring the unexpected triumph, Skinner had recognized that it was only one battle. He'd known that it would never be that simple.

There were sides. But he knew that the lines blurred and shifted. The skirmishes had been waged for year. That time he'd wound up on Mulder's "side." Skinner had always known that the sides could and would change again.

But he'd always thought that when he finally sold his soul to the devil it would be for Mulder's life. It never occurred to him that it would be Scully.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

_Office of the Assistant Director  
3 days earlier_

The news of her cancer had indeed been a surprise of the worst sort. Another blow to the pair. How much more could they take?

He was struck anew by her presence and bearing. Standing in his office, straightbacked, her gaze direct and unyielding, she embodied for him what an FBI agent should be: honest, ethical, dedicated to principles of truth and justice. Skinner realized that such words had lost much of their power in this day and age. That they were regarded by many as trite -- hackneyed. It made him feel suddenly old.

Scully had pulled a gun on him, she'd lied to him, she'd been furious with him over the closing of her sister's file, but she'd also saved his life. In every case he'd known that she was driven by a clear vision of truth, and, trite as it sounded, justice.

She had always been direct and unyielding in her insistence on the truth, whatever form it took. Delivering what he understood to be her own death sentence, she remained unflinching in her recognition and acceptance of what she knew to be the truth this time. He wondered how Mulder could stand it.

He'd brought up the leave of absence only because he knew it would be expected of him. Knowing Scully -- knowing Scully and Mulder -- Skinner had figured that she'd want to keep working.

He'd been surprised, however, when they'd brought up "investigative avenues" and the abducted women. When Scully insisted on pursuing things through the Justice Department, "for my own reasons," he'd known that the day had arrived.

 

On his way home that night, for reasons only partly obscure to himself, he'd walked up Pennsylvania Avenue to the Navy Memorial.

The plaza was quiet and deserted on that cold night. The understated elegance of the memorial had always appealed to him, despite his lingering loyalty to the Marines. He had always found a certain familiar comfort in the quotes inscribed on the edges of the fountain that ringed the map of the oceans and seas at the center of the monument. Sea-faring men who understood duty, loyalty and sacrifice -- concepts that it sometimes seemed to him belonged to a different country and a different time.

That night, it was the John Paul Jones quote that stopped him, 

_I wish to have no connection with any ship that does not sail fast; for I intend to go in harm's way._

Harm's way. A little melodramatic for a former Marine -- but fitting, perhaps. Scully's father had been a Navy Captain. Besides, it was clear that things were going to be a bit melodramatic for a while.

The next morning, he began to make the necessary arrangements.

 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Two days later, when he walked into his office to find Mulder there (how did people keep getting past Kimberly? he wondered with only idle exasperation) he knew he'd made the right decision.

Mulder had barely been able to hold himself together. Staring at some indiscernible point outside Skinner's window, his voice was scarcely recognizable as he asked Skinner to "set up a meeting."

The ensuing conversation had held further unpleasant surprises, but perhaps not unanticipated. Skinner had never been able to fully decide what had happened to Scully in those missing months, but he had generally come to believe that it was a less extra-terrestrial explanation than Mulder was likely to. The file directory from the fertility clinic simply compounded those suspicions.

Vietnam had instilled early and immutable lessons about what man can do to man.

He'd won. He'd convinced Mulder that he had to find another way.

It had been a narrow victory, he realized. Mulder was closer to the edge than he'd ever seen him. But it reinforced Skinner's decision. Mulder had to find a way to the truth about the conspiracy, without becoming its tool.

Skinner needed that. He would need that. Mulder had to stay his own man.

Skinner wasn't naive or stupid. He knew that there was a conspiracy and that his agents were both inextricably caught in it. Skinner understood however, that it was far darker and more subtle than either Mulder or Scully, for all they'd seen, currently understood.

Oddly, though Skinner had long ago realized that only Mulder's brash approach -- blunt, almost naive -- fueled by his dogged determination would ultimately bring down the network. And Skinner also knew that Mulder could only keep going with Scully at his side.

And, finally, Skinner understood that he would have a much better chance of leveraging the black-lunged son-of-a-bitch than Mulder. Mulder had far too many weakness and pressure points of his own -- the chain smoker could manipulate Mulder a hundred different ways. If Mulder managed to bargain for a cure for Scully, he would never escape, because there were too many other vulnerabilities: Samantha, alien bodies, hybrid technologies....

Skinner was far less vulnerable -- no wife, no family, carefully concealed views -- it meant that maybe, just maybe, he would have a chance to escape when all was said and done.

************

Entering Mulder's office for the meeting -- the lack of subtlety in the SOB's location choice scarcely escaping his notice -- Skinner felt a tightening in his stomach, a speeding of his respiration that he hadn't felt since Vietnam. A day he'd been the point man on his patrol, and had walked into a jungle clearing where he suddenly _knew_ there was an ambush. He'd nearly been killed that day, and one-third of his patrol had been wounded or killed. He wondered now how he'd leave Mulder's office. And, of course, the chain smoker had had to toy with him. They had to play out the drama. The devil took his due. Skinner was forced to ask: "I need a miracle."

Perhaps it was fitting, after all, that he trade his soul for a miracle -- for a modern miracle. And he couldn't help but think of the situation in those quite melodramatic terms. The truth was that he did think the cigarette smoker was the devil, or at least evil incarnate, which was pretty much the same damned thing.

If Scully wasn't the embodiment of truth or honor (and he knew instinctively that she'd hate to be called that) she was probably the closest thing the FBI had to such a thing. He felt a kinship with Mulder in his desire to protect her. Knowing at the same time, that she would hate to think that either of them felt that need. 

The only question, really, was the price. It would be significant -- of that Skinner had no doubt. He had spent the night before running scenarios through his mind: a demand to shut down the X-files; dissolving Mulder's and Scully's partnership; transferring one or both to remote field offices. He'd carefully prepared arguments and counter-offers to each.

You tried breaking them up once before. It didn't work. If you remove them from Washington they will be that much harder to watch, to control.

There were other, darker possibilities: betrayals, treacheries, misdirections, lies. He thought, perhaps, that Cancer Man would exact some personal price from Skinner himself, as well as fulfilling whatever impersonal agenda he represented. Skinner knew that there was a score to be settled, and this time he held very few cards.

But when Cancer Man refused to name the price for Scully's miracle, Skinner knew it was going to be much worse than he had initially anticipated. The back and forth was tedious:

"What'll it take?"

"For Agent Scully's life? What would you offer?" 

"What'll it take?"

Then, an unexpected and awful reply:

"Well. I'll have to get back to you on that."

And suddenly the abyss yawned even more widely. Far from being the devil, Cancer Man was only a minion, a messenger. Skinner knew with a terrible certainty that he hadn't stepped through a looking glass; he'd walked off a cliff, and there was no telling what waited at the bottom.

***********

That 5 a.m. meeting, he realized later, had been no accident. Hadn't been merely to prove that the Cigarette Smoking Man could make him come and go at inconvenient will. They'd known, somehow. Known that Penny Northern would die that morning; that what Mulder had found would prompt him to call, one way or another.

He was glad to know that Agent Scully had decided to return to work. Mulder would need her support more than ever in the coming days.

"There's always another way." 

Repeating his earlier insistence to Mulder, he savored the irony for a brief moment. There were always other ways, but they were fewer now, and probably not the ones Mulder envisioned.

"Yes, I believe there is...If you're willing to pay the price."

The price had been named.

The bargain sealed.

As he watched his new master leave, Skinner found himself realizing that there no hope of escape. None at all.


End file.
